


The Grass Is Dead On This Side of Town (Help Me Water It)

by putyournamehere



Series: Let it Rain, We Can Build a Home [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Dissociation, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Psychosis, Suicide Attempt, no actual death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-26
Updated: 2015-07-26
Packaged: 2018-04-11 05:29:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4423178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/putyournamehere/pseuds/putyournamehere
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Because people like me are the 'crazy' ones, aren't they? The ones that hear voices and see things in the dark and do stupid things without even being in control. That's always how this has worked, Oikawa."</p><p>Iwaizumi could handle the shifty eyes and malicious whispers, whoever they were from, but not from Oikawa - never from Oikawa.</p><p>Or: Oikawa just wishes Iwaizumi would rely on him for once</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Grass Is Dead On This Side of Town (Help Me Water It)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Here's a quick run down of warnings:
> 
> There is a suicide attempt which is discussed, as well as psychosis (talk of hallucenations) and dissociation. I talked about these things from experience, having depression and a psychotic illness myself and being prone to episodes of what can be dangerous disspciation, so this is mostly a vent fic for me. These are only my experiences though, and everything that happens in this fic I have dealt with/witnessed to an extent, but they may not match up with other people's experiences. 
> 
> Anyway; you should listen to 'Step Out' by Jose Gonzalez for this fic, it fits very well. Enjoy!

Iwaizumi dug his fingers into scalp, breathing coming fast and ragged, but he didn't notice anything. He knew someone was near him, their voice floating around, but it was completely out of Iwaizumi's reach. 

This kept happening; everytime he thought it was the last time it would hit him again and his head would spin and the world just seemed a little watery for him to grasp. It was a weird sensation, not being able to ground yourself in the present or organize your thoughts, letting chopped up sentences and half words leave your mouth as you try to sound them out and call for someone,  _anyone,_ _help_?

Dissociation, that's what the counsellor called it (and boy did the fact that he was now obligated to see a counsellor twist his gut). They hadn't give him a diagnosis, but then again Iwaizumi had barely listened, only vaguely recalling words like depression and psychosis and therapy.

He hadn't told Oikawa of course. He couldn't; he didn't know what would come of it, but revealing to his best friend that something was wrong with his head of all things made him want to hurl. He'd seen the way kids and adults alike threw the word crazy around like nothing, and sneered at anyone who spoke of delusions and hallucenations like his; to think that Oikawa might call him crazy wasn't an idea he could deal with. Everyone else? Fine, let them talk, but not Oikawa,  _please not Oikawa._

It wasn't his fault. One night full of stress, stress and more stress led to him lying awake and hearing nothing but murmuring, full of annoyance and contempt. The next day he walked to school and pointed out that  _something_  seemed to be following them to school; Hanamaki and Oikawa just looked at him and told him that nothing was there. He managed to pass it off as exhaustion while hearing no end to Oikawa's fears of his health, but the thing never went away as well as the collective muttering that he wished he could understand. Then he started blanking out, his mind leaving him while his body went on autopilot. Nothing too bad happened except for a confusing lack of memories, until one day he woke up to two large handfuls of pills in his stomach and his mother had to call and ambulance. That was a bad day and it made Iwaizumi sick to think about it.

He didn't know what he had just been doing. He knew it had to be in school, which made it a lot worse already. The voice was still calling out to him, and he was still completely unable to understand it, but it was soothing and solid and constant while the world swirled and danced around him, so he latched on to it while he could, held it like a lifeline and- Oikawa?

_"Hajime?"_

Iwaizumi forced his head up and vaguely started to recognise the figure kneeling in front of him. It was Oikawa (whether that was good or bad Iwaizumi didn't want to dwell on it), his eyes full of concern and uncertainty. He'd never see Oikawa so worried and...scared? Did Iwaizumi put those emotions on his face? How could Iwaizumi scare him? Belatedly he realised Oikawa had been speaking to him and he desperately tried to follow. 

"...with me? ...nod....yes"

Eventually he nodded (that was the command right? Did he do it? Was he even present?) There was a second voice, somewhere to his left but he didn't bother trying to decipher the words, just let himself relax somewhat as the world started to settle into view. 

"What happened?"

Oikawa stared at him. "You don't remember?"

Iwaizumi shook his head. The last thing he could recall was being in the lockerooms about to get changed and there was nothing but voices and voices around him from his teamates and that damned muttering and he couldn't take it he couldn't-

Ah. So he really must have dissociated. That would explain why he wasn't playing volleyball and instead was sitting in a cold dark street.

Oikawa was worrying his lip, trying to find words (Iwaizumi wished he could take that lost look off his face, it didn't belong there, not with Oikawa, their captain - had Iwaizumi scared him that much?). The second voice spoke up again.

"You really don't remember anything?" It was Hanamaki, leaning against a wall (where were they? He couldn't recognise it). Again Iwaizumi shook his head.

"Just tell me, it can't have been that bad."

Hanamaki and Oikawa shared a look that did nothing to ease the nausea Iwaizumi was suddenly feeling.

"Tell me."

Oikawa spoke. "You tried to jump off a building."

Iwaizumi looked to his left to see an old, grey apartment building with stairs leading to the roof. "...oh."

Apparently that wasn't the right answer because Oikawa suddenly looked...angry? But it was gone in an instant, replaced with that calm look that meant anything but good. 

"The coach...he said to bring you back to school once we found you." Hanamaki said. "Can you stand?" 

He stood, slightly off balence but soon the three of them made their way back to the school (he noticed they were keeping him strictly in the middle and away from the road, but he said nothing). Once they were outside the gym, Oikawa strode in and called for Coach Irihata, while Iwaizumi pointedly ignored the stares and glances of the rest of the team from the doorway.

Leaving Oikawa and Hanamaki in charge of the cooldown, and ignoring Oikawa's protests to stay with Iwaizumi, the coach walked with him to the nurse's office.

"Oikawa told me what happened."

Iwaizumi's jaw clenched and he said nothing. The school didn't know about his last dissociative episode-gone-wrong, to have them involved now just made things complicated.

The coach sighed besides him. "I understand you've been dealing with some health issues lately, but running out of school isn't the way to deal with your anxiety. You need to let us help you."

Iwaizumi paused. Anxiety?  
  
"I know it's hard, but I wish I'd known about your anxiety earlier. At least now we can help you stay calm so things like this are less likely to happen."

Iwaizumi kept quiet. He had no idea what Oikawa told the coach but it was getting him a free pass from an awkward parent-teacher meeting. They arrived at the nurse's office and Irihata turned to him.

"Have the nurse check you over. For my peace of mind at least." He added at Iwaizumi's look. "Make sure you take care on the way home, okay Iwaizumi?"

"I will, sensei."

Irihata smiled, squeezed his shoulder before walking back the way they came, leaving Iwaizumi with the nurse.

The check over proved fine except for the general 'get some rest'. He went to collect his bag from the locker room, the team having gone home by now, only to find Oikawa waiting for him there. The silence grew tense in an instant as Iwaizumi moved to collect his belongings.

"You didn't tell coach about what happened."

Oikawa shrugged moving away from the wall. "He didn't need to know the details." Iwaizumi was grateful, despite Oikawa's stony attitued. They locked up as normal and went on their way home, but the silence carried on. Eventually it became too much.

"Oikawa-"

"Who do you think should be captain next year?"

Iwaizumi blinked. "Excuse me?"

Oikawa hummed. "I'm thinking Yahaba. He's really great a motivating the team, ya know? Even Kyotani and Kunimi listen to him...to an extent."

Iwaizumi said nothing as Oikawa continued to talk about whatever came to his mind. It was clear that he was avoiding the subject completely, but Iwaizumi was, for once, at a loss for words. It wasn't that he particularly wanted to talk about it, but what happened earlier wasn't something that could go unspoken. 

"Oikawa, stop it."

"Stop what Iwa-chan?"

Iwaizumi scowled. "You're avoiding the subject completely." 

Oikawa stopped at the beginning of their road where they usually split ways, turning to him. Suddenly the tenseness that was in the air before somehow tripled, and the nausea from earlier hit Iwaizumi at full force with the way Oikawa was looking at him. 

"What do you want me to say?" 

Iwaizumi was at a loss. "I don't know, something? Anything? I know you have something to say, just say it." In a moment, Iwaizumi could of sworn he saw Oikawa's eyes water, heard his breath hitch, but Oikawa quickly turned his face away, letting out a small huff of laughter.

"For once Iwa-chan you're wrong." Oikawa turned back to him, and Iwaizumi's breath caught at the broken look on his face. "I don't know what to say." Iwaizumi didn't either. Before he knew it, Oikawa was already walking to his own house. "You'll stay safe, won't you Iwa-chan?"

"I- yeah."

"Good."

And with that, Oikawa was gone.

 

x

"Why didn't you tell the coach about yeaterday?"

Hanamaki looked up from his lunch. They were still waiting on Matsukawa and Oikawa to join them in their usual classroom.

"What do you mean?"

Iwaizumi played with his food, not looking up. "The coach thought it was anxiety that had me running away. Didn't even mention the idea that I nearly jumped off a building." Hanamaki looked down at that. 

"It was Oikawa who spoke to him, not me. I don't even know what happened." The last part held a clear undertone of  _explain._  

Iwaizumi sighed. "I told you I don't remember."

"I know that but... how?" 

He shrugged. "Apparently the psychiatrist thinks I'm dissociating."

Hanamaki looked up. "Psychiatrist?"  _Shit._

"I...yeah. I have to see a psychiatrist." Iwaizumi hated the idea, didn't want to talk about it, but Hanamaki deserved an explanation at least.

"Has this," Hanamaki gestured widely, "happened before?"

"Yeah...sort of." Iwaizumi shifted uncomfortably. "It wasn't a building if that's what you're asking. I overdosed on some paracetamol." He held his breath for a response. There was a few beats of silence before Hanamki sighed. 

"You know you're meant to tell your friends when these things happen, right Iwaizumi?"

"I know." 

Hanamaki started eating again. "It's not your fault. We've just been worried about you. All of us." Iwaizumi looked up at that while Hanamaki continued. "It's your choice whether to tell us all of this, but we're not going to turn you away, 'ya know? You need to learn to rely on us for once." Hanamaki pushed his lunch to the side and grinned. "Now finish your lunch already. We're going to arm wrestle and I'm going to win this time."

Hanamaki lost three more times to count before Mattsun and Oikawa joined them. They enjoyed lunch as usual, but Iwaizumi could still feel the tense air between him and Oikawa, with Matsukawa glancing at him every now and again. Hanamaki's words stuck with him; it had been four months since everything had started and the only people who knew were the school councilor, the psychiatrist and his mother, all out of necessity. Of course, he had only told Hanamaki about the dissociation; the constant shadows that seemed to stay with him and the murmuring in his head were another ordeal completely. Even while they were eating lunch, Iwaizumi watch the shadowy shapes shift behind Matsukawa, floating in the window sills and above the desks. It would be unnerving if he wasn't so used to it by now, but even so it was hard to keep track of conversation when they kept moving near and far, near and far, near and far, near and-

"Iwaizumi?"

The three of them were staring at him. "Huh?"

"Lunch is over. You alright?" Mastukawa asked. 

"Yeah, yeah I was just," Iwaizumi glanced at the shadows, "just distracted." He knew they didn't buy that excuse, could feel the questions left hanging, but he made no move to answer them.

"Well, we'll meet you and Hanamaki at practice, right Iwa-chan?"

"If we even make it that far." Matsukawa huffed. "You hoard of fans are already waiting to eat you alive."

"How rude! They're just devoted, that's all."

"Or maybe they just want lunch. You don't look very appetizing though, to be honest." Hanamaki grinned.

"I'm not sure how to take that." Oikawa and Matsun were soon out into the hallways as the teacher walked in to begin class. 

"Remember what I said, okay Iwaizumi?" Hanamaki didn't wait for a reply as he went to his seat, leaving Iwaizumi alone with himself and the shadows on the wall.

The murmuring in his head picked up volume, making it nearly impossible to concentrate. He knew he was close to failing this class but somehow he couldn't bring himself to care, as he moved through the hallways to the club room. No one mention him running off yesterday in practice, but he knew they were giving him worried glances. Even the coach was putting less stress on him to get his spikes dead on. Normally he'd be aggravated being treated in such a soft way, but today he was grateful as he left practice earlier and returned to the club room. The murmuring in his head was unbearable in practice, get louder and louder and swirling around his head and working it's way all through his mind and body until all he wanted to do was bash his head against the damn wall and make it stop _damn it_. 

With a sharp pain to the middle of his forehead he'd realise he had, in fact, slammed his head into the wall. The murmuring still continued and he growled in frustration.

"You shouldn't do that, Iwa-chan, you'll destroy the few brain cells you have left." 

Iwaizumi turned to see Oikawa move in from the doorway. "What are you doing here? You're missing practice."

Oikawa shrugged. "Coach let me leave early. Make sure you didn't run into the road." 

Iwaizumi sighed. "Right." They changed in silence and left before the rest of the team finished. Iwaizumi would have said something, but his head felt so damn  _heavy_ and it was all he could do to keep walking straight. He took a glance at Oikawa who was being unusually quiet, staring up at the sky. Normally he'd be moaning about how 'Iwa-chan' had made him miss practice, and how he had to abandon his precious kouhai, but he remained silent and tense.

"Oikawa-"

"It's happened happened before, hasn't it."

Iwaizumi blinked. "Excuse me?"

"The...the jumping of the building thing. You'd done that sort of thing before." Ah. So now he wanted to talk about it. Iwaizumi sighed. 

"I didn't mean to." It was an admission nonetheless, and Oikawa stopped dead in the road.

"Why?" he asked. 

"What do you mean why?" 

Oikawa turned on him, his body tight with tension.

"Why did you do it?"

Iwaizumi sighed. "I told you I don't remember, I just... I blank out sometimes, alright? Like going on auto-pilot. The psychiatrist called it dissociation."

"The psych-" Oikawa blinked harshly (were those tears? It felt like a punch to Iwaizumi's gut to think that he was the cause). "How long? You've been going through this without telling me for how long?"

"Four months."

Oikawa took a deep breath. Iwaizumi wanted to comfort him, he did, but their usual way of doing things were shattered here. He couldn't give Oikawa logic or reason, couldn't get him off the floor and shining once again because Oikawa wasn't the one down on the floor, it was Iwaizumi. And that wasn't how things went between the two of the, Iwaizumi was meant to be the sturdy pillar for Oikawa to lean on, the rely on - this wasn't how things were meant to go between them. But they're here now, and Iwaizumi could do nothing about it.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

He thought about it for a moment, before sighing. "It didn't seem like a problem."

"That's a lie and you know it, Iwa-chan." Oikawa took a step closer, the nickname doing nothing to ease the tension. 

Iwaizumi threw his hands up. "Fine. I was scared. You happy?" Oikawa stared at him before he continued. "I didn't want you to know because you'd call me crazy, how's that?"

"Why would you think that?" He was genuinely confused and it infuriated Iwaizumi.

"Because people like me are the 'crazy' ones, aren't they? The ones that hear voices and see things in the dark and do stupid things without even being in control. That's always how this has worked, like with Himada-sensei when he quit teaching."

Himada-san had been their maths teacher, in their first year of high school, before he had a breakdown in class and was put on extended leave, which then turned into a permanent absence. His name was still passed around, tagged with the general  _'ya know, the crazy one',_ or worse variations. Iwaizumi refused to join in with the malicious discussions they had, but they rang in his head, reminding him that he was in the same boat, that he was the 'crazy one' that people would look at shiftily if they knew, edging away and sharing whispers. Maybe he was crazy. He didn't want to think about that, especially while Oikawa was still staring at him so intensely, barely a foot away. 

"Who cares what people say?" Oikawa said, grasping at the lapels of his blazer. "When have you ever cared what people say?"

"I don't care about them, idiot!"

"You're afraid I'd be like them?"

Iwaizumi said nothing, and Oikawa's grip tightened until his knuckles went white. "Why do you care?" Iwaizumi said, pointedly look away. 

"I care because you could of been dea- hurt. You could of been hurt and I didn't even know!" Oikawa shook him, shaking ever so slightly. "Four months and I didn't even know you were suffering!"

Their faces were barely two inches a part now, and Iwaizumi could clearly see tears drying on Oikawa's face. It wasn't like he ever needed reassurance of his friendship with Oikawa, but seeing him now, so worked up over Iwaizumi's safety still sent a shock through him. 

"Oikawa I-"

"Don't! Just stop okay!" Suddenly he was dragged forward, and he could do nothing while Oikawa held onto him like a lifeline, crushed in his embrace. He could hear Oikawa's harsh breathing in his neck as he slowly bought his hands to wrap around him. Funny how it felt like he was the one comforting Oikawa after everything that had happened, but it felt nice. Familiar. Over the months he'd found comfort in the murmmuring in his head, in a perverse morbid way, resigning himself to being alone withe the shadows that seemed to surround him. Yet here Oikawa was, clutching him desperately, and somehow in an instant he regretted not telling Oikawa sooner.

"I'm sorry." 

Iwaizumi didn't know how long they spent holding each other, but it still didn't feel like enough (he didn't think he could ever spend enough time in Oikawa's embrace). When they parted Oikawa rested his forehead on Iwaizumi's.

"I'm not going anywhere, you know."

Iwaizumi smiled. "I know."

His head was heavy and as always he felt like he was rotting from inside out, but with Oikawa here there was a silent promise of ' _I'm not leaving. I love you and I'm not going anyway_ ' and he thought maybe, just maybe, he could live to see this through.

 

x

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> If you need to talk I'm always here, or at metaphorical-pie (tumblr). I'm going to continue this series into a more in depth look of the issues here, both from Oikawa's point of view and Iwaizumi's, if you want to stick around. Stay safe everyone!


End file.
